"For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light." -Ps. 36:9

Dance by the Light of the Moon V

August 29, 2009

“I hated my step-mother,” Nanny told me. “She was jealous of my father and me, that we were so close. She’d always try to cause trouble somehow.” She’d always tell me this after telling me that her mother died when she was just eleven. She didn’t like the fact that her father got married again.

Other times she’d tell me about how she met Pop-pop. I looked at their picture right after they got engaged. He’s tall and handsome; she’s short and pretty wearing a nurse’s white cap and dress.

“I was given a tour by the head nurse of the hospital when I first saw your grandfather,” she might start, adjusting her rather large glasses. “I asked her who he was and she said, ‘That’s Dawson Gilman, but don’t set your sights on him, because he doesn’t pay a bit of attention to the nurses.’ I decided right then to get his attention. So I was walking down a flight of stairs one day and saw him sitting with a patient in the lounge area. I quickly turned the heel of my shoe and fell down the rest of the stairs. He came over and picked me up, and that was that. One day I was working and he came up to me and asked—when I was finished work—if I wanted to get married. I said yes, and we got married in the courthouse.”

Pop-pop lived in half of the house, where there used to be an apartment, and Nanny lived in the main part. They rarely spoke to each other; Pop-pop ignored her and Nanny said nasty things to him. It was that way for as long as I can remember. They were divorced, but they lived in separate parts of the house long before they divorced. Pop-pop moved over to that side after a newly appointed Catholic Priest told him he was living in sin. In the sight of the Catholic Church his marriage was not recognized, and his children were illegitimate, because Nanny wasn’t Catholic. Mom remembers that Nanny yelled at the Priest to get out of her house.

Wow. You’ve hooked me. Can’t wait to read more! I mean, I’m so sorry that this is not ficiton–don’t we all wish the sinful parts were just make-believe? I love the way you move your stories along with short sentences and dialogue, and the physical details. Do write on!